Samantha, the pug-nosed cat, and Daniel Harlan, a homeless man who owned her, were reunited Tuesday.
Harlan wept when Tom Neville, who had the missing cat for weeks, gave Samantha back.
"I thought I'd lost her for good," Harlan said.
The cat and Harlan got together again after The San Francisco Chronicle ran a story Tuesday, along with a picture, about the cat's disappearance. Neville saw it and recognized Samantha as the animal he rescued from life on the streets.
Harlan was convinced his Himalayan cat had been stolen and maybe sold for money. He searched all over for the cat and tried to file a missing cat report with the police and the SPCA, but had no luck.
As it turned out, the cat hadn't been stolen at all, only rescued. As Neville tells it, he was driving to work one rainy morning and spotted a wet and bedraggled cat tied on a leash under the freeway at a homeless encampment near Eighth and Brannan streets. Dogs were nearby and, to a stranger, the cat's situation looked desperate.
Neville said he asked around, but nobody knew anything. So he picked up the cat, put it in his car and took her to work.
Harlan said he put the cat on a leash while he went to get food at a nearby store. When he returned, Samantha - his companion for nearly four years - was gone.
Meanwhile, Neville had taken the cat under his wing. She was a mess, he said. Her hair was matted, and she had fleas and sores. He gave her a bath, fed her and gave her a warm place to sleep in his waterfront office, where he is a management assistant for a hotel chain.
The cat thrived, he said. "You should see her now," he said.
Neville was working on finding a permanent home for her, when a friend called and told him that the cat he'd rescued had its picture in the paper. Sure enough, the cat in the picture looked very much like Samantha, the homeless man's missing cat.
Neville was torn; he believed he'd given the cat a new lease on life. He didn't want to see the animal go back to the homeless life. "I wanted to do the right thing," he said.
He thought about it for hours, but then got Harlan's phone number from The Chronicle story and called. Harlan told him about his life with Samantha.
"He does love her," Neville said. "No question about it."
He invited Harlan to his office to see the cat to be sure it was Samantha.
"He cried when he saw her," Neville said.
Neville offered to buy the cat, but Harlan said he couldn't sell her. So Neville gave the cat back, along with some cat food and $40 to help out.
He also gave the cat a standing invitation to stay in his office, any night.
Harlan used the money to buy a new collar and leash for Samantha along with a cart with wheels for the cat, a sleeping bag and a few necessities.
He said he hoped he could find a place to live. Maybe a shelter would take them both in. He wasn't sure. He planned to spend Tuesday sleeping in the Transbay Terminal.
"They don't bother you too much there," he said.
Meanwhile, Harlan and the cat have become minor celebrities - their story got out on the Internet, on radio and television. He got hundreds of phone calls on his cell phone, some from faraway places like Kuwait, Germany, Korea, and Mississippi, he said. Some offered money.
"I appreciate all the help people are offering," he said. "But I can't take money. I've always tried to do stuff on my own, but it don't work most of the time."
Samantha, the cat, took a walk on her new leash, allowed herself to be petted, looked at Harlan with her startling orange-colored eyes and had no comment.
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